Now She's Gone
by nakala
Summary: Crane has been thinking, and you know what? There will never be another her. Set post midseason premier.
1. Chapter 1

**Just a little something I cooked up during the midseason premier. Standard disclaimers it's fanfiction it should go without saying.**

Now She's Gone

It wasn't until he had lost her with seemingly no possible way of bringing her back that his heart began to ache. He remembered the love he had for Katrina and this was nothing like that. What he could recall of his fleeting marriage was a romanticized version of reality that would always be so. Katrina wasn't his first love, but she had been his only.

Abbie had been the best friend he'd ever had, his only true friend in all his lifetimes. He loved her as a friend, yes, but only as such. They were partners, witnesses. Just that and nothing more.

Then he'd mourned his deceitful wife and consequently managed to move past her lies and accept his loss. He would always love her, his Katrina, he would always remember her fondly as his gentle, soft spoken, head strong love. Crane would have it no other way. When Katrina disappeared from his dreams, when the anger subsided, and his heartache dulled he was still blinded. Too stubborn or just stupid, it didn't matter.

She couldn't see or believe and neither could he.

They felt it. Both of them felt the electricity sparking between them. Could almost decipher the smoldering glances. Knew well the meaning behind each gaze, but they were blind.

Abbie couldn't measure up. She wouldn't-couldn't be to him what he had believed his erstwhile wife to be. Therefore, she didn't bother. Crane was oblivious. Had he known the lieutenant had such thoughts he would have told her better. Not that he would have offered himself, he did not believe that was to be their destiny, but he would have told Abbie that she was an exceptional woman, a phenomenal warrior, and a magnificent beauty. Any gentleman worth his weight in gold would have been lucky to have her, he'd say. But he never knew. Not when she traded herself for Katrina and not when she'd said her last goodbye to save her sister.

A month later and he was losing his mind. He missed her with everything he had deep inside of him. Longing dug hard into his soul and desperation burned the edges of his heart. He needed to find her or he'd die. How could he continue without her? He'd lost too much, they'd done too much together for him to ever do it alone. Or forbid with another.

It was in the moment when he'd given up – maybe not abandoned the search for Abbie altogether, but accepted that, for now, Abbie was lost to him - that his eyes finally shed their scales. Perhaps it had been months before then when Daniel Reynolds slipped into their lives in Sleepy Hollow threatening everything that they as witnesses, nay, partners were. Abbie's new boss demanded her time. The strict, watchful eye he kept on her scarcely left her enough time for herself let alone being with him when it didn't directly involve their mission. At least then he had her, but now she was gone and he'd wasted time he didn't know they didn't have.

He could smell her in what he'd began to call 'their' home. Not all over. She had been gone long enough for her un-replenished scent to grow faint and indistinct in most of the rooms, but when he wanted to be close to her, he would venture into her domicile. The one place she'd kept for herself when he'd moved in. The thick fragrance of vanilla and lavender filled his nose and toyed with his senses. Here he could see her in the corner chair by the bow window – hear her laughter floating in the air.

He sat in her room for hours, well into the morning. Most nights he never let his eyes close long enough for it to be considered sleep anguished with himself and furious with her. Abigail Mills. Ichabod would lie in the center of her bed at a complete loss wishing she would come back just so that he could scold her for being so reckless and for having so little care for her own life. Hoping that one day he could hold her in his arms and fall asleep surrounded by her aroma and the feel of her beating heart pressed against his side. He often dreamed of telling her he loved her and apologizing for taking too long to realize he'd loved her much longer than he had once thought.

Most nights.

Other nights he fell into fitful slumber in his room haunted in his nightmares by his future without the woman he loved and of his cowardice for giving up only to startle awake to her voice calling his name.

He would never love her as he loved Katrina, no. He knew Abbie. There weren't any secrets between them that could remain hidden. Their bond was forged in honesty and truth, as ironic as the sentiment sounded to him in her absence because there was one thing he'd realized she'd expertly hidden from him. After reliving each moment they'd shared with his eidetic memory, Crane wondered why he'd only noticed when it no longer mattered.

This revelation kept him up at night in her room pouring over ancient spells and researching artifacts and any supernatural loophole he could hope to find long after his talk with Jenny and especially after working with Sophie. Who, in her own right, was a great agent and strong person, but wasn't his lieutenant. The removal of his idea board at the archives wasn't a pretense, but it did not mean what the others thought it meant. He was finally awake and his enlightenment was the reason he bothered rising in the morning to face another Abbie-less day. Why he decided to keep his portion of the search to himself. It was his sustenance. Abbie loved him, and he would traverse a thousand hells ten times over if only to hear her say those words to him.

 **Thank you for reading. Please leave a review I value your input (as corny as that sounds).**

 **nakala**


	2. Chapter 2

He wasn't Luke. He wasn't anybody she'd known or came close to loving. She didn't offer her heart without much thought and reticence. Her past had taken care of that. An absent father, troubled mother, and a dependent sister. Then she was all alone fending for herself and getting stuck in all kinds of trouble because what else was there to do. Corbin tried to teach her differently. He was the father she had always wished she'd had. He'd lived up to every ideal she had thought a dad should be. Abbie didn't ask for anyone other than the sheriff. She didn't need her real father or the drama his new family could bring. She didn't want anyone that didn't want her.

Yes, Abbie was an iron vault. Her life and her love was hers to guard because she couldn't trust anyone to do it for her. Maybe too much had happened to her during her formative years that caused her to fear letting anyone in. It had been just as hard for her with her adoptive father. No less difficult with the only blood related family she could tolerate. It took multiple death scares and more than a few screaming matches and minor scuffles before she and Jenny had come to share their hearts with one another. There wasn't a chance she would fall in love as easily as the princesses in fairy tales. Love hurt. Love was hard. Love could kill. Abbie would rather remain as whole as she'd managed than allow some man to come and take a piece of the person she'd cultivated only to discard it when he found out how damaged she truly was inside.

Then Crane came from a bygone era and stumbled into her heart, most definitely against her wishes. She wasn't blind, and despite her affinity toward the more stout muscular type, the almost frail gentleman was beautiful in a way she hadn't noticed in a man before. It wasn't just his looks but his chivalry, the way words slid off his tongue and slipped from his lips in a stream of colorful, fragrant language. His passion set a fire wherever he went even sinking into her armored heart melting the hardened walls as easily as the first spring warmth to a frozen pond. Ichabod protected her as much as he relied on her. Something no one she'd ever been with had ever done. He saw _her_ as much as he'd missed the tiny clues his wife had littered in her wake. The wife he'd loved without dissimulation and blindly. And yet, with all of his attachments and utter foolishness, Abbie thought he'd fallen into a crack in her heart that had been forged by her growing relationship with her sister and his surprisingly resourceful manner of getting her to drop her guard. To be herself even when doing so meant facing truths she'd rather not.

It'd happened slower than it'd ever – it had never happened before. Before Crane, Abbie had never had a love or been so fully submerged in her feelings for someone else to submit to the idea of love or even experienced that unmistakable symptom of caring for some other's wellbeing over all else. She'd been close to love, it had certainly touched the surface of her heart but not allowed to enter. Love made you vulnerable and blind. Love could hurt you, and it wasn't any differently loving Crane.

Her relationship with him seemed to be evolving. They seemed to be moving closer to each other mutually, but there came a prophesy and Crane allowing her to sacrifice herself for the wife that was revealed to be a dimwit with a weakness for evil, unredeemable children.

That hurt.

He left her and it hurt. When she returned it was to deal with _As the Crane's Turned_ and an ungrateful Katrina. She, Abigail Mills, who supplied the witch with everything she needed and a home. Katrina was living on the labor of Abbie's back and to watch Crane – her fellow witness, her only friend – not check his wife stung. Standing on the sidelines while he abandoned her to fix his marriage – choosing his family over their bond, hurt.

It hurt.

She loved him, but Abbie would not be a fool for love.

After Katrina and during their time apart without the threat of Moloch, Henry, or the apocalypse, she lived. Abbie became an FBI agent, and Daniel. She let someone in that was available, handsome and worth the effort. It was never going to be a love story standing the test of time or anything she wrote home about, but she'd tried. She missed Crane and fighting the big bad a little, but she had tried.

Yet somehow as she marked another tick on the wall of the cave she couldn't for the life of her remember Daniel's face, the sound of his voice, or how she felt in his arms or their nights spent together. It was only Crane, her partner. The feel of his feathery touches at her elbow guiding her across the street. The timbre of his hearty laughter and his piercing stare. The smell of sandalwood and mahogany. 10 months trapped in the catacombs in another plane of existence and she'd come to terms with her feeling for her best friend 3 months ago. When she wasn't searching for a way home she thought of Ichabod, talked to Ichabod, played chess with Ichabod, strategized escape routes with Ichabod.

She loved him and being stranded in some other dimension made it all the more obvious to her.

Abbie was an observant woman and a more than competent officer of the law. She was aware of the tension strung tight between her and Crane. Only he wasn't or didn't want to acknowledge it himself. She wasn't good with rejection, so; Abbie didn't bother acting on the stolen glances and the inquisitive expressions. Playing the unrequited damsel in this story wasn't something the agent knew how to do. Neither was she skilled in seduction nor did she know how to sway the outcome in her favor. Crane had a type and she didn't fit it. So, she kept quiet and encouraged him toward Zoe and a happy life without his wife, even if it didn't include her the way she thought it should.

She was going crazy. She knew it. Could feel the prickly fingers of lunacy scraping at her mind. Abbie blamed Crane, if he wasn't on her mind she could focus more on finding her way out of wherever the heck she was instead of fantasizing about ways to tell him how much she loved him. She had worked through every permutation of her saying "I love you" and all the possible outcomes. Did it make her legitimately beyond her mind that in most Crane actually reciprocated her feelings? She thought so.

The sound of sand sifting into the metal pan she'd found reverberated off the walls of her mind. She could hear each individual granule make its mark. The silence she wanted to endure lost to her only means of keeping time. It was funny, all she had was time. Time that she was so short on all the way up until the end. Never enough time for work _and_ missions. Not enough time for herself, to find someone that could help her forget about Crane and fall in love with. And yet, she had found the time to believe that in time she and Crane would meet in the middle and finally be on the same side of right. Thought she had enough time to tell Crane she loved him.

Now she didn't know if her silence was worth the protection it gave her from certain heartache. Now it didn't seem to matter. She wished that she had told him because she may never get the chance. Abbie could very well have missed her opportunity to try. To be a fool for love even if it didn't have a chance of working out.

She would do it. She would tell him the moment she clawed her way out of this new purgatory. Abbie would fling her arms around his neck and she'd would shout out how much she loved her fellow witness, her friend Crane.

Abbie would do it.


	3. Chapter 3

She didn't say it. He didn't hear the words 'I love you' come from her lips. He could see them in the sparkle of her eyes in the moments before she'd fallen through his astral form. However, as soon as he'd given way under the pressure of her touch, Abbie had locked her feelings away. Ichabod understood. Though, his pain wasn't soothed because of it. Didn't stop the burn in his chest at how unhinged she'd become even if his friend had somehow managed to hold on to a bit of her sanity.

He could see the fringe unravelling, his 'leftenant' was losing her mind and thusly could not accept his presence as fact. He'd had to push his carnal need to reach for her and declare his love, which he believed was swiftly becoming undying, aside to focus on her. Her appearance wasn't as worse for wear as her deserted surroundings would have suggested. For Crane found her hair in it's natural state to be much more desirable than the straightened version he was used to. Regardless of her haggard state of mind, it seemed as if she hadn't had to miss a meal since the day she _chose_ to walk out of his life. In a split second, he'd assessed the situation enough to reassure her of the truth of his appearance. All else could wait. Once he got her back to their world he'd say it for her. He'd take the lead.

Time had been of the essence, but he had allowed Abbie to unburden herself enough to join him in the quest to find her escape. Hearing her speak of him as her anchor warmed his heart immensely, but also reaffirmed what he already knew to be true. He was the right person to rescue her.

He couldn't suppress the fullness he felt working with Abbie again. The others were great, but nothing compared to Abbie. Hearing her voice, catching every nuanced and quirky expression. She was so expressive. He loved it. He loved that if paid the proper amount of attention he could read her face as if it were a page from a book. They were at the cusp of solving the puzzle of Abbie's escape when the tether to his astral projection snapped. Then he was lost in darkness for an immeasurable volume of time, until he heard the sound of her voice pulling him towards her.

Big brown eyes coated with tears welcomed him upon his return. Her sigh of relief blew into his face startled him into understanding. He was back. He was finally back with her. It was just the two of them and the feel of her hand in his. Her eyes caressing him as they inspected him. There was so much he wanted to say, but couldn't. When was he ever at a loss for words?

Ichabod wanted to tell her that it had felt like centuries he'd been in the darkness separated from her. He wanted to say how he'd missed her beautiful smile and the blatant sarcasm. He opened his lips to say just that, but his mouth wasn't cooperating. He couldn't think with her touching him as she'd never done before. It was more than holding hands. She was speaking to him and he didn't want to part from the feel of her attention. Hated to separate from her gaze and at that moment when he'd all but jerked her away from Joe with all eyes on him, especially her bright eyes, he was too scared to say the only three words that should have come from him. Instead, he decided on levity as opposed to baring his soul for everyone to see. Perhaps her attention was purely reflective of her mental state from the catacombs.

Ichabod faltered.

It wouldn't be a stretch to say that ten months was a long time with one's self not to re-evaluate matters of the heart. In a few weeks, he'd come to realize how much he loved Abbie and relied on her presence. The opposite could be true for her, except for her reliance on him as an anchor. She hadn't said anything that would lead him to think otherwise. Sure he could see her affection for him, feel it, but maybe she was holding back because she'd come to the conclusion that he was an idiot and didn't deserve her. He would understand. However, with her fingers lacing and roving over his, hope rooted firmly in his heart forcing his wayward fears into oblivion.

The car ride home was quiet and heavy. His fingers tingled to tangle with Abbie's. He couldn't keep his eyes on the road for stealing glances. Surprisingly, Abbie didn't notice. Her eyes were trained forward, posture rigid, but something about the ease of her breath and the softening of her features kept Crane from worrying too much.

When they pulled into the garage, Crane hastily exited the vehicle to open the door for his passenger. She bypassed his outstretched hand slipping past him hardly waiting for him to catch up; yet, the gentleman in him put aside his breaking heart, refrained from sulking or accosting the FBI agent and opened the door to their home for her. As if in a trance, she staggered through her home up the stairs unmindful of the man following a couple of paces behind her. Abbie's fingers grazed the wall on the path to her room. She noticed pictures of her, some of the both of them, some of her and her sister along the way that hadn't been there prior to her sacrifice. She tilted her head glancing at Ichabod from the corner of her eye. Unsure of her question, he simply lowered his eyes from hers.

"I can remove them if you like."

Her brows furrowed as she returned her attention back to the image of her and him that Jenny had taken without their notice.

"No. It's fine."

It wasn't until Abbie had made up some imaginary resolution that she moved into her bedroom. Crane followed moving on autopilot as though attached by an invisible ribbon clipped when she turned sharply facing him with her door to her back.

"Um, Crane?" she smiled, but her eyes told a story of confusion, exhaustion and hurt.

"Oh, pardon me, I – I will – I will – would you like me to cook you something?"

That smile again. "That would be perfect. I'll be down after a shower. I just need to wash all the grime and dust," she shivered clenching her eyes shut, "of that place off. And wash my hair. It's a wonder I still have any after a year with no moisturizer. I'm rambling. Yeah, thank you, Crane. Food would be nice. Now that I'm back I'm starving. See you in a bit?"

Crane bowed slightly and dismissed himself.

Believing Abbie would be down in roughly half an hour because she wasn't one to fuss over herself, Crane busied himself with cooking her waffles, eggs and bacon. She was always quite partial to breakfast foods. Everything was completed and plated on the table in a little over the half hour he estimated it should take him, when he noticed he was still alone. Ichabod checked the clock above the oven. He'd give her ten more minutes. She did just get back after almost a year. She needed time to herself. He would give her that. For ten minutes he watched the clock, counted the seconds, set the food in the oven set on warm. At five minutes, Crane quietly made his way up the stairs. He stopped at the top wondering what he was doing. She'd be down when she was ready. But what if something was wrong? What if she needed him? Pacing back and forth with his hands clasped behind his back, Crane thought on all the reasons he should breech the agent's self-imposed solitude. All of a minute he debated with himself. It all came down to the fact that he couldn't wait. He'd gone weeks without her; he didn't want to go another second without her tonight.

Ichabod tapped on her door, but a response wasn't returned. In a fit of panic, he beat the door harder hoping that maybe she was just asleep and that would rouse her. He couldn't think of what else could be keeping her from the door. He'd seen the level of insanity that was on the edge of being unleashed.

Calming himself, Crane tried the knob; it wasn't locked. So, quietly he quickly slid into her room to find her sitting at the foot of her bed staring ahead unblinking. She had on something soft, a pajama set with short bottoms. Her hair was pulled into a bun at the top of her head still glistening with water and emitting a soft coconut fragrance. He stepped deeper into the room as if drawn to her.

She didn't budge or acknowledge him when she spoke. "It smells like you in here." She swallowed hard. Didn't look at him.

Ichabod cleared his throat. "Uh, yes, I used your room as a headquarters of sorts for my research to find you."

Abbie giggled, a dark haunted sound then peered up at Crane imploringly.

Her appearance exposed her confusion.

"Abbie tell me what it is and we can fix it. Perhaps we can work it out together."

"I wanted that so many nights," she shook her head and scrunched her nose which pulled at her features, "days. I hoped you'd come and we'd fix it. You'd make everything better. Rescue me. Like you did your wife." From the corner of her eyes, she met his bearing down on her. "I don't think you can fix this – fix me – now, Crane."

Crane wasn't reading into her cryptic statements, but he thought there was something he was losing in translation. Or maybe not.

"I could try, Leftenant," he whispered daring to answer a question she had not asked.

She turned her head so that she was watching him unobstructed, but that wasn't good enough. Rising from her bed, she crept toward him until she was standing in front of him. Her hand rose to touch his face as if expecting him to vanish under her fingertips.

A breath pushed past his lips and his eyes fell shut. The tips of her fingers roved over his cheek, his chin, then they ghosted over his lips igniting a trail of electricity down his spine; he could not stop the catch of his breath as his hands twitched toward her but never left his side. He would not spook her and she disappear. He would not lose her again.

His eyes remained closed while he allowed her the freedom to do as she pleased when her hands settled on his neck. He felt her cool breath splay across his lips. The lids of his eyes popped open to catch those of Abbie's fluttering closed when her face moved closer to his. He watched silently taking in all the shapes of her face, her eyes, lips, her brow.

Her mouth landed softly on his and his eyelids lowered heavily at the sensation. Crane was surprised but not too surprised to return the pressure of her tender kiss in kind. It was over too soon, before his mind could truly grasp that he'd been kissing the woman he loved, her apologies brought him from the clouds.

"You have nothing for which to repent."

"Yes I do. That – that was inappropriate." She backed away abruptly turning from his face leaving him with only a faint glimpse of her fear and the impression that she wanted to escape him. Them.

"I'm sorry. It's just – I – it was stupid and you should forget it."

Crane startled. He couldn't believe his ears. She was denying his love for her, the jolt that he knew sped through her body the same as his when their lips touched.

"You cannot mean that."

"Oh but I do, Crane. I don't want whatever it is you think you need to offer."

"Abigail."

She bristled at the use of her given name as though splashed with ice cold water.

"I do not know what you presume that I am _offering_ , but I must inform you that it is given with the utmost sincerity. I assure you I only have the purest and honest intentions."

"Yes, always so pure and sincere." Abbie spun around. "And let's not forget honest." Her voice broke as tears filled her eyes. "How honest you've been concerning your feelings. Always with the lingering glances and stolen touches, but always so eager to define our friendship. Our platonic partnership despite the bond that formed between us but you ignored it or maybe you didn't feel anything for me. That would be the only explanation. I do not want your pity or your fear. Misplaced affection in the name of keeping me here with you. Playing on the feelings I know you knew-"

"I did not know, Abbie." He spoke softly yet his anger was still kindled.

Her brow scrunched in confusion.

"I hadn't any inclination that you possessed… _feelings_ for me. I will not lie to you, had I known-before, it would not have changed anything. You were my partner, a beautiful, strong, amazing woman but _only_ my partner." He stepped closer to her.

She moved backward.

"I knew it. I knew it. Get out. I-Crane leave. I don't want to-"

"However," he voiced over her. "Things have changed. Maybe-no-you _were_ correct in your observations. I am just saddened that I did not see it when it was staring me in my face."

Abbie took a step sideways toward Crane with her head cocked to the side and one eyebrow raised. "What are you saying, Crane?"

"What I am saying 'Leftenant' is…I love you." He gazed into her eyes when she didn't respond Crane glanced away mumbling to himself that this was not how he envisioned professing his love. But he could still try because Abbie did not seem to register what he'd just said.

"I know that I am a bit too late and this seems the most inopportune moment, but it is true. I didn't understand my feelings for you until you were gone. I am deeply apologetic for that Abbie please believe me."

His ears were assaulted with more of the laughter he was beginning to hate, but also exasperation.

"I can't help but think this is some kneejerk reaction to all that's happened. In a week or month, you'll everything will be back to the way it was and you'll go back to saying that we're better as just partners."

Crane shrunk in on himself.

"I'm in love with you, Crane. I have been since pretty much before I traded places with your wife. But I don't want-"

"Give me a chance." His voice pleaded where his words demanded.

"I can't play that game with my heart."

"Then believe me. I love you. I've only loved one other and that doesn't' compare to the way you make me feel. To be in love with someone I can trust who is as beautiful and resilient as you. I would never give you up. I never want to be only partners with you. Abbie, I'm in love with you and with all my heart I do not see that changing."

He took her face in his hands. Then gazing into her eyes, whispered "I love you. Please give us a chance." Ichabod touched his forehead with Abbie's. "Please."

A tear seeped from Abbie's eye. "Crane?"

"Please, Abbie."

She pressed her eyes closed and in that moment she looked like she was giving up on them. He would not let her back away. He couldn't let her deny him the chance to get to love her and to be loved by her.

He leaned closer until his lips rested on hers. He didn't force or apply pressure. He needed her to meet him half way. If she didn't any assertion he made would scare her away. He lingered, hoping. Waiting.

She pulled back and Crane thought he'd died the moment the warmth of her lips was gone. He moved to separate himself from Abbie. To escape the humiliation of heartache beaming down on him, then he was being pulled down and into his happiness. Her lips were full of desperation and relief. Quite the vixen, he thought as she teased his bottom lip between her teeth. He liked it. It was honest and not at all demure. He yanked her closer with one hand tugging at her waist too close to the apex of her bottom to be respectable while the other tilted her head enough to allow him to deepen the kiss. He couldn't get enough. Her plush lips. The hint of something spicy, yet, sweet. She was everything and he was never going to let her go. He would do the best he could to only ever elicit tears of joy from her.

Again, it was she that ended their kiss leaving him wanting.

She chuckled at his frustrated sigh. Smiled into the light kiss to her lips that threatened more.

Abbie gently shoved him away before he lost his control. "I'm starving. Didn't you say something about food earlier?"

Crane appeared disoriented and a little disappointed.

Shrugging, Abbie answered, "I'm hungry."

He raised an eyebrow at her.

She laughed and kissed hungrily. "Does that answer the ten million questions you're dying to ask?"

He nodded dumbly.

"Okay, look, I know you _need_ to philosophize over this and you can, but right now, come with me down stairs. I need food. If you feel like it, you can work out the particulars while I chew. Yeah?"

"Yes."

"Good." She smiled.

Abbie grabbed his hand in hers and led him to the kitchen where he presented her with the spread that was thankfully still edible.

He watched her eat stealing strips of bacon from her plate. She was right they could figure what it was they were after she was fed.

He didn't want her to choke when he mentioned marriage.

The End.

 **Sorry for Ichabod's voice. I tried my best. Hope I didn't disappoint.**

 **Thank you for reading.**

 **nakala**


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